Tuesday, 02 September 2014

Body Politic

Modern fad diets remind me of Israel's leftists - they both lead to surrendering strategic and vital areas.

A lot of the fad diets have penetrated the Observant Jewish world, which is infamous for unhealthy eating especially on Shabbat - after services Kiddush of liquor and pastry, followed by a meal of white Challa, potato and noodle kugels and cholent, with a desert of more cakes, roasted nuts and parve ice cream.

Sure, many "victims" of the fad diets have lost tons of weight. But they don't exercise. Their bodies therefore look like big empty burlap sacks draped on bone. At least when they were fat, their muscles had to work to carry the extra weight. But now, nothing. No muscle tone, just empty flab.

Modern society has become so focused on weight loss, that any weight loss seems to be good. It certainly is not. You look better and feel better when you increase your muscle-to-fat ratio. In other words, by exercising and increasing caloric intake - especially with quality protein and good HDL-producing fats - you gain weight big time without adding a millimeter to your waist or hips. In fact, your trousers or skirt fits better than ever.

The impressive initial weight loss of the "effortless" fad diets comes from losing the strategic and vital area of your body - your muscle mass. Therefore, the goal of dieting should be to improve body composition, the percentage or ratio of muscle to body fat, like we said. You do that by losing fat without losing muscle tissue. Maintaining and even increasing muscle mass is critical to weight control, because the more muscle you have, the more calories you burn.

That's what I call "Body Politic". So, forget about your weight and just be strong and healthy. When you eat right and exercise, you'll burn fat and build muscle anyway. G-d willing, I hope to post more body-health and fitness pointers in the near future. Meanwhile, stay healthy!

Shalom Reb Lazer. I would like to emphasize that while exercise is important, especially as one ages, it actually has very little to do with weight gain or loss.

I would even say it is impossible to lose weight solely through increased exercise. For example, swimming, widely considered to be in the top tier of caloric expenditure, burns roughly 500 calories per hour. If a person swims non-stop for seven hours, he will lose a grand total of one pound of fat...then promptly regain it to satisfy incredible hunger.

The only way to lose weight and keep it off is to change one's diet. It isn't even that hard. I myself have lost, and kept off, nearly 20kg. I could regularly lose 1/2 kg per week, solely through minor dietary changes. My LDL-HDL ratio is beyond excellent too.

Diet even affects muscle mass, as this just published NY Times article on low-carb diets (what you would call a "fad" but I would say is more correctly a total lifestyle adjustment) that low carb diets not only are good at losing weight, but simultaneously add muscle mass.

BS"D
Well said Rav Lazer.
True, exercise alone will not reduce weight & Rav Lazer did not say it would. He did say it must go together with a proper diet. That is what the Ramba'm said.
As a veteran health care giver (45 years) & nutritionist I must say that Rav Lazer's point is correct.
I will add that in most cases obesity is triggered by a subconscious fear level etc causing the body to build a "defensive wall".
By treating this under the carpet fear base the system will pretty much on its own reduce volume/weight.
Classical Homeopathy (especially the methods developed by Dr Sankaran et al) combined with Guided Imagination is likely the most successful safest way to go for this.

Kol HaKavod Rav Brody for posting! Can't wait for more health and fitness info! I learned from Rav Brody, as much as we need to keep a 'healthy neshama', we need a 'healthy guf' to be it's partner! Toda Raba!